Lackluster
by StrawberriesAndCinnamonJAM
Summary: "You tilt your head to the sky, and you scream at the heavens. You scream at the angels, and most of all, you scream to God. You scream that you quit." We all fall down. Dark fic. AU.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: And it is a… darkish fic? I can't really decide whether it can be classified as a dark fic, so I guess I will dub it as a semi-dark fic.**

**So many dark fics lately… I wonder what that says about me? O.O **

**Warning: Suicide. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

Dreams snap back to reality. Filtered sun snatches you from free fall and flings you to stable ground. Eyes flash open, and the world focuses, straightens out. Inconsistency and tree-covered skies fade to imagination and lackluster hope as you face life again.

Up from bed, drag your feet across the floor, and stare into the mirror.

You smile, and the reflection twists plump lips into a gnarled grimace.

You brush your hair; smooth it down. Stroke on make-up with precision; cover up your face more and more each day, as if another layer will change what you look like.

Like it will change the stares directed towards you.

Like it will change everything, anything.

You march out the door, robotically, blankly. Your school uniform smoothed without creases or stains.

You must look perfect. You _must_. At least today, of all days.

_Dear Mom and Dad,_

Your shoes scuff across the sidewalks, soles scratched and torn by little rocks with sharp edges. You try to lift your feet higher, stop them dragging, but you find its not worth the effort.

The world is a blur, flying by like nothing, because it is nothing.

You're in the school, tiny heels clacking on polished floor. People mill about, stranded by their foolish thoughts and one-track minds.

You're hoping to slide by them, through a slipstream.

To be unnoticed. Unseen.

You don't want to face their scorn, see their laughing eyes.

_I'm sorry, its time now._

The whole world is mocking you. Every single set of eyes that looks down is mocking you. Mocking you and your failure to live.

Your failure to be pretty and sweet and just like everyone else.

Your eyes turn out the window, to the too blue skies and too white clouds. You remember that dream you had, where you were flying, flying and falling. Where there was no ground, but only an empty pit, to swallow you hole.

You yearned for that emptiness.

But you woke up before you sunk. You woke up before the good part.

It was a dream, a dream without clarity and without fact.

Even so, you wanted that void to be reality, and you wanted it bad.

_You thought I was happy, but you thought wrong. You thought I had everything and I didn't._

Ignore everything, all of them. The eyes that drill holes into the back of your neck, the laughter that only barely reaches your ears.

You put the crumpled paper balls landing in front of you out of mind, sweep them off your desk like the annoyances, the little flies that they are. Never mind the amusement of your audience.

You know all the words, you know all the insults

You don't need a visual to verify their existence.

_It just goes to show how well you know me. _

You vaguely remember the time you had friends, but more so, you remember the time you thought you had friends.

That belief was destroyed when you stopped looking out of the corner of your eyes, and found that you were talking to yourself for God knows how long.

They said you were meant for great things, good things. Their words were poison that pushed you downhill.

You were a girl with good grades and good friends. With good demeanor and good speech.

Now all you say is fuck it all.

_Once I've written these words, you'll be able to say you never made a mistake._

You're done. You're done with everything and everyone. With this life, this world. It's all gone up in smoke now. Everything you dream is simply made up of unfounded hallucinations.

There is nothing left for you.

You tilt your head to the sky, and you scream at the heavens, you scream and angels, and most of all, you scream to God.

You scream that you quit.

You're done with these games, done with this torture.

No more.

_I__'__ve__got__nothing__to__left__to__say__…_

White, porcelain paper with an ivory tint, flattened out in your hand. The ink shining and wet, is spider web coating that ensnared your words. You let it drift down, to alight upon the ground.

You know they will find it.

They'll scour the room. They'll find everything, all your dirty little secrets, so they'll definitely find it, right out in the open.

Your hand trembling with anticipation, you reach forward. Curled fingers wrap around the hand, the wooden drawer scraps as its pulled forward.

It opens, with a rattling sound from the back corner.

You reach in, the small walls of wood grafting on your skin.

Your hand wraps with relief around the bottle. Tiny white capsules, your future, your life.

A deadly elixir disguised as the smallest of things. A mirror that you're looking into.

_With love, your daughter, K. R. _

A plastic container falls down. It doesn't rattle, empty as you yourself.

The floor meets your head, like a nursery rhyme.

_Goodbye._

We all fall down.

**A/N: Review please, it will make me happy. :)**

"You tilt your head to the sky, and you scream at the heavens. You scream at the angels, and most of all, you scream to God. You scream that you quit." _We__all__fall__down._ Semi-dark fic. AU.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: And the second chapter is done :D I was surprised I got it out so quickly, as I had no plan to continue this story past a one shot, and still have no idea where this is going... anyways...**

**Warning: Mentions of Suicide**

**Disclaimer: Don't own Bleach**

* * *

><p>The world shifts and stirs, black curtains falling away to reveal the start of the play. You whimper, involuntarily, on reaction, as the comfort of being unable to see is dragged away.<p>

Your pupils shuffle about, confused, disoriented by the resolutions of your reality.

And then it comes to you, in a flash, a burst. A mash of disappointment, despair. A mixture of any and all amounts of loathing; self directed.

The walls are closing in on you, white and looming; just far, far too white.

Hospital. Hospital so clean, its been scrubbed and wiped 'til the walls had a palor as pale as its patients

And you hate it

You hate how the white walls thrown with shadows match the dark circles drooping under your eyes.

You hate how you're in here, not in bliss, not in emptiness. _Here, _in this god-forsaken place of sweet smiles, and hushed tones. Of lies and deceit and miss-aimed truths where they tell you 'You're going to be okay', because of course, there's an okay in hell.

You swallow, feeling the tubes of oxygen thread into your system.

You wonder how many times they lost your heartbeat

You wonder if they'll lose it again.

* * *

><p>Times flies by, like mud through the cracks of your fingers. You sleep, blink at the ceiling, and sleep again.<p>

There's no structure, no times. Night is day and day is night.

With the lack of windows interrupting the prison, you can't distinguish between sun and dark.

There's not much to do, other then look and stare.

You have no restraints, no leather straps, no buckles. Do they not intend to keep you? Do they think that there's nothing you'd rather do then sit like a useless lump? A useless, _breathing_, lump?

It's because they think, believe, that you want to stay.

They believe that now you've tasted the scent of death, felt it, you'll be too scared to float down that path again.

But it's not that, it's definitely not that.

You've _seen _it.

And you want it. There's an ache in your chest, a boa constrictor on your hope.

You want it _bad._ It's a drug that wormed it's way through your body and left behind debris. Ruined, wrecked debris of disintegrated drive.

There's no fight in you left; just nothing, but that longing. Longing for a lack of hurt, for everything to just be numb.

You've grasped it once, and you _will _grasp it again.

* * *

><p>They let your parents through.<p>

For some reason, they seem to think that you'd want to see them, that you care. The most you can do is turn your head away, shut your eyes, and pretend they're not even here.

Except you can't block their voices; can't get them out of your head, no matter how confused and jumbled together the words are.

There's a sickening pit in the deep of you're stomach, a hollowed out cavern that makes you want to fade away.

Their tones are laced with poisonous words. No confusion, no upset. Only anger, demanding, unrelenting anger baring down on your eardrums and pounded through your ears with sound of beeping at it's heels.

They still have your letter. You look from the corner of your eye as they pull it from their pockets, crinkled and ruined, but not tear-stained.

No, never tear-stained.

They shake it at you, thrust it forward, the wrinkles on their foreheads matching the crevasses on the paper.

The disappointment is clear.

The same disappointment that they throw at you every time you screw up, every time you're human enough to make a mistake.

Disappointment because you can't even die right.

_But __I __will. _You promise them silently. _I __will __get __it __right __next __time._

* * *

><p>Slowly, and surely, you plan.<p>

Again.

It's a repeat of all those months that dragged by, the ones where you only watched the world whip past you, and you planned.

Step by step. A time, a place, a way.

You'd have to start straight from scratch.

Back to smile's and shrugs and ever so often, an _honest_ 'I'm okay'

Because that's how you fool people, that's how you trick them. That's how you use deceit and deception to worm your way past all their eyes, and under their noses until you're free to throw it all away.

You will put them in a sense of comfort, of safety. All of them, even the so-called professionals, will think you're okay.

It helps that you know exactly what to say, helps that you know exactly what counts as a sign of 'healing'.

It helps that faking is second nature now.

You can reach the spot of no return again, it's easy, simple, but it will be harder this time around.

You screwed up, fucked yourself and now you pay for it. Pay for it in suspicion and surveillance

There's nothing you can do but crawl.

Crawl and drag yourself across the ground, even as your knee's are reduced to strips of skin and bloody stumps.

You're two steps behind the start line.

And you want, _will_,be two feet under the finish line.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Right then, you like? **

**Now, before I get any planning in, I need to ask if you readers want a happy ending or a sad ending. Just leave your choice in a review...**

**You've been warned, if I don't get enough opinions than the end will be set for sad (as in suicide O.O) as that's how it was originally planned.**

**Drop a review please. :)**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: I only just realized thats it's been a month since I last updated. Sorry, forgive me DX I have my reasons though. I was focusing on my other story.**

**Two stories at once doesn't work well with me, one always takes the back seat :D**

**Anyways…**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

* * *

><p><em>Now I lay me down to sleep.<em>

It's time. After so many lies said, so many truths misled, it's time. You're at the end point, the finish.

_I pray the devil my soul to keep._

It didn't take long for them to trust you, for them to believe that you though it was a _mistake. _A mistake made up of pent up emotions and confused self-identity.

But, no. The only mistake made was the one where you hurried through the curtain. The one where you allowed there to be time to be found.

The mistake where you lived.

However, that doesn't matter.

What does matter, is that mistakes can be rectified. After all, if one can learn from it, one never makes the same mistake twice.

All it took, was a lot of waiting…

_If I die before I wake._

It had been torture, the past year, to be all smiles and nothing else.

At least your parents had been relieved, to find that you had no intentions of spurting out the truth of your days spent away. That way, there would be no rumors, no secrets, to scorn the family name.

A car accident, you lied. Even to the teachers, the principal.

Nobody knew. Nobody knew your deep secret, as translucent as it was beneath the opaque. Not that it was a problem. Nobody knew anything, after all. It was just another secret, as two-faced and bitchy as all the others.

A secret lurking right at the edge of your throat, behind pearl white teeth and washed lips that words leaked out of like poison.

And everyone believed.

Saw your smile and turned away with a laugh.

Oh, how you couldn't wait to leave it all behind.

_I'll thank the skies for sweet relief_

You know you can't go out the same way you did before.

It's too obvious, too noticeable, and the possibility of being saved, too _high_.

But it won't be difficult to find another way. No, not at all. You already have something in mind.

It's a fairly simple thing, leaving everything behind. You had already done it once, if only for the barest of moments. You've already tasted it, the barest hint of satisfying nothingness.

You can't wait to get these bugs out you're head again. The ones that crawl through your mind and cause your hands to twitch and shudder, as you hold your pen, hold your hairbrush.

And your just so fucking close.

_As I lay me down to sleep _

The days have gone by now, and you've only become more alone. There's nobody left, not even yourself.

Just pain and blood.

_I pray the devil my soul to keep._

You've being waiting it out, so patiently, so quietly, but you can't even stand it anymore. You're trembling with urge and with need, urge that you can't satisfy, and need that can't be sated.

It's eating you up, you lips ache from even the hint of smile, and lips crack with every word you speak.

Spider legs of blood creep across your eyes, because there's no relief in sleep anymore. Half moon circles swell on your palms, because you have to clench them every time you hear those mocking voices.

You can't take it anymore. You _can't _take it.

And with every nick you have to think the same thing.

Only three more months. Just three more months.

And slowly, slowly, it rubs down to one.

_If I die before I wake._

They scream and yell, lash out and scorn. All because you're ruining their name. _Our _name.

Because you're slipping, slipping, and they can't see it. They think you're being rebellious. That's only the blind accusation of a name for suicidal. They can't see it, just as much as they can't see past their own noses, past their greed and self-indulgence.

You're meant for great things, you've been told.

So don't screw it up, you've been told.

Well too late, you've already done that.

You've already crawled so deep into that hole that there isn't a light at the end of the tunnel anymore.

There's nothing for you anymore.

You would curse those who made you this way, shake your fist and curse, if it weren't for that fact that you saw it as a blessing. It doesn't matter how much you hated them, it doesn't matter that it was their fault.

They'd show you the way out.

Although you do remember a time -when you could still let the tears fall- that you went to sleep praying for someone to save you.

Now, you pray for someone to push you. Push you farther into the spiraling circle that you've been tracing the edge of.

_If I die before I wake._

It's time. It's really time.

If you still had tears inside, they'd be leaking out of your eyes in relief. Not happiness. No, you didn't do happy anymore.

Your breath is shaky. For once, the corner of your mouth curves upward in a half-smile. Perhaps sadistically, perhaps sickly, but still a smile.

You will succeed. You _will_. Finally.

Perhaps some sappy lady who cries for everyone and everything will have tears for you, but nobody else will. You'll become nothing, disappear from world. Firstly known as the girl who killed herself, then forgotten. And nobody will remember your name.

You're alone. And will be alone, for hours.

You have time, you have a way.

Everything is set up, for the play to begin.

The running water overrides your mind, becomes the song that you monotonously dance to, and the liquid pools quickly. Your toes dip in, cool water slipping past your skin.

Lowered down, right to your end.

Your fingers play across the ice metal, dancing little ballerinas.

You retrace those blue wires, the ones that keep the beeping alive.

"I'll go to hell for heaven's sake."

And the world frays into crimson ribbons.

_I'll go to hell for heaven's sake._

**A/N: A depressing chapter to write (and probably to read.)**

**By the way, there's going to be an Ichigo next chapter :D**

**Review I'll write faster :)**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: I told a few reviewers I'd have this out in the end of January and I'm obviously a week early. Oh well, my muse wouldn't leave me alone and this all just kind of came out. :P**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

It's like a high. Not a rowdy, color twisted high, but the one that fogs through your mind in a haze, and tosses you in a field of euphoric oblivion.

Aches and pains vanish into nothing with every stroke, with every time you retrace worms into your veins.

All so you can leave the terror in the dust.

You can only watch with malicious fascination as spools of red thread your arms and that buoyant emptiness fills you up again.

An obscene addiction to that brief moment of bliss that you felt; the one that infused you with a tantalizing craving for more.

It comes in short blasts, only by the hour, at the cost of another scribbled line to match all the others.

You've got art on your skin, and you're proud of it.

* * *

><p>Back to white walls. Again. Back to stares of pity and questioners whom gleam every bit of juice they can, if only to spin a tale to tell. Back to hushed tones that speak of 'that child', who came once and came again. The misunderstood one, the <em>disturbed <em>one.

They probably recognize your face.

They probably realize that your so-called 'clean bill of health' meant nothing when concerned with your winding, knotted yarn of thought.

You've done it again, you've failed again. God must really hate you now, you think. Because if he cared, would he not want to end your suffering?

You can see his laughing face in your peripheral vision, the chuckles that wrack his frame as you pray to die.

Death itself turns a blind eye, not willing to take a soul such as yours.

It doesn't matter.

You don't matter.

And you don't know what to do with yourself. You can say with such determined certainty, that success doesn't lay in your path.

So you drift. Drift endlessly, words just a hazed blur and life blending into a smear of paints, all the colors hopelessly smudged to a dredging black. You're uncertain, undecided.

It'd be hell to fail once more.

It'd be hell to meet those eyes again, to hear those chapped words from those lips again.

And yet, you understand so very well that hell is all that waits for you now. A sin against yourself is a sin against the heavens, after all.

Or so it is said.

There is no repenting now. Forever is an eternity and you can't stand to wait that long.

Not anymore.

* * *

><p>They all wonder what happened to you. The truth never told, the burrowed tics beneath perfections mask never revealed. you lie so easy now, mistruths coming through cracked lips with a flickering forked tongue.<p>

Besides, you're past caring about opinions now.

You simply stand beside them, head cocked to the side and wondering with morbid curiosity just how many of them fake a smile, if any at all. Wondering if there's anyone like you.

No one seems to notice that your eye's dart around and never blink. That your fists involuntarily fold in on themselves, or that you self-consciously tug the threadbare sleeve of your uniform down every chance you get.

You're just as invisible as the air now.

Except the air matters more.

People can't exist without air, but they can and will exist without you.

They won't even notice when your seat is finally empty and it will take a month for them to realize there is no returning.

But it's fine with you. You don't need people to care, don't want people to care.

Despite contrary belief, you don't crawl and scream for desperate attentions sake. No, soothing words create the monster of your nightmares, concerned eyes the virus to your systems.

You'd rather they all avert their eyes, lest they catch your disease.

* * *

><p>You don't know what your still doing here.<p>

Eyes and hands all around you, pressing you in on all sides, holding you down, unable to free yourself. But you could still escape, duck down and slither away. The people around you would only shuffle to fill in the spaces.

And that you would do, except your own eyes were trained on something else.

He was running back and forth, just like all the others

Except not like them.

Because it was _him _that they were whispering about, him, that if it could be done subtly and without notice, they would be pointing at without shame.

Ugly eyes followed him, a liight with rumor and sliming scorn, the tentacles of gossip already slipping out from between pursed lips.

But the reason for the sneering hate lined with curiosity, was not only because he stood out in a crowd, not for shocking sunset of hair a top his head.

No, it was something that even your wondered about, something that set a yearning fire of unfamiliar feelings deep within your stomach.

And you knew.

You _knew_, that you and him were parallel monstrosities in a somber state of mind.

Those bandages, albino and red tinted that snaked up his arms told the truth, the lies only circling but never touching. You fingered your own through the sleeves of your thinning jacket. Yes, the same, other then the fact that he could stand it, could stand the looks of gnarled disgust and wonderment that traced his every step.

You marveled him. Marveled how he seemed to pay no mind, to not care that they all knew, could all see it.

It was obvious just what those looping bandages meant, and not just to you.

You were filled with something, a strange emotion that coasted your entire being, and all those eyes around you faded to the background.

You found yourself thinking; what do they matter?

And find yourself thinking; they don't

Something puts you in a strange state of mind, like that time you hit your head and there was blood in rivulets down your face, but you couldn't feel it. Voices talking to you, but you couldn't tell what they were saying. Hands holding you, but you didn't know whose they were. It had all blended into a blur, and you couldn't even make out the carpet beneath you.

Yes, it was exactly like that time.

You found your own hands, sliding up and over your shoulders, carefully shrugging until the coarse fabric slipped down your arms. You let the jacket drop to a heap on the floor, and then pushed, shoving past arms and legs, forcing your way through the mocking onlookers.

Stumbling away from the mob, you didn't pause to study the surprise, the astonishment on the faces of others.

You didn't stop to take into account how their lips were already curling, snide remarks already flying.

You just ran, feet slapping across the ground as if you didn't know how. Your feet aligned with his, your run already slowing to jog.

The euphoric high of companionship made you never want to stop, no matter what words plugged up your ears.

So you didn't, you ran with it, ran with him, four arms with matching bandages swinging side by side.

**A/N: Yay, Ichigo. I've had that scene planned out for awhile. By the way, if there's a ton of mistakes, I apologize. I fixed it all once, then lost it and was to annoyed to proof read it again. O.O**

**Review, I'll write faster! :)**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: It's nearly been a month. O.O Whoops.**

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><p>The months pass quickly, and you find you're no longing watching the clock.<p>

It's strange, because you realized a long time ago that you could've ended it, ended everything.

At that time, there was no eyes on you. No eyes except for his.

But you didn't do it, you let the chance slip by like grainy sand between your fingers. You didn't _want _to go. Not now when you had some just like you. Some just as damaged.

You saw that you weren't the only broken thing in the world.

It was no longer a lonely existence.

Whispered words and rumors scattered about the two of you; birds of prey with scathing judgment.

They all saw you for what you were, a freak.

Everything you had worked for until this point was gone, but it didn't matter. None of it. The need to blend in, to hid behind a mask and to not be seen for what you were: it all washed away the minute you met his eyes.

He taught you how to step out behind the curtain, and you were free.

Freer then you'd ever been, even before your last real smile.

* * *

><p>All you ever did was talk. Those hours, out on the roof together, were spent exchanging words and nothing else.<p>

Despite the scorn, and the angry words flung your way when you returned home. You didn't care. Not about what they thought, or what they did. You ignored how they clung on to you, forbid you to go, threatened you to stay.

You always left anyways, for hours, and hours, and hours. Talking, because there was no one else to talk to and nothing else to do. It was an easy way for you both to live out your last days.

You didn't care that nothing had really changed.

You didn't care that the lines were still there, both fresh and old. It was just that now, there wasn't just pure, obsessive need to do what you did. Now, there was joy in it.

And pride, pride in what you were. Both of you felt that pride, because both of you understood, saw what it was like.

Two of a kind, gross and scaly creatures, but still alive.

Two amongst millions, but still not alone.

You no longer envied those around you. Their ability to laugh and be normal. You didn't need, or want it anymore. They were the ones to be pitied now. After all, there was no escape for them, while you… you had a possibility of doors, of ways out.

Freedom wasn't closed to you, as it was to them.

* * *

><p>Everything fell into silence.<p>

Both you and him, had no words to say.

But that was okay. You were still together, fingers oddly entwined as some sort of ritual, as if the feeling of his skin on yours was just as liberating as the lines you drew each night.

Your voice had run out, as had his, but there was still something to be gained by each others presence.

Everywhere you looked now, the world was in petulant shades of grey. You were completing unmotivated, uninspired. You no longer had a goal for yourself, even if your previous one could hardly be counted towards a purposeful life.

Indeed, you were floating in lack of purpose, the world a blur around you, as you couldn't care less whether you were here or not.

You just continued with the mutilation, unwilling to stand in recognizable form any longer.

* * *

><p>He wants to leave he says.<p>

He wants to go to the place of no return.

It only takes your one second of hesitation for him to realize that your not with him. That you think it worth it stay, if only a bit.

You know why. Because just the sight of him, the _scent_ of him, brings you to strange stupor, and you foolishly think that with his hand in yours, perfection becomes the world.

He doesn't disagree, but he's ready to leave and your not.

You never imagined this. Of the wishful thinking and close call and failures, you never imagined there would a time that you didn't want. That you wanted to stay, _here_ with all the people that gagged at your very presences.

You didn't understand why heart was betraying, and you wished you didn't have one.

His mad, and you see it. The scowl across his face, the disappointment in his eyes. _I though we were the same_, he says.

You wanted to scream as his retreating back, to pound on it and tell him that you are, you _are _the same. But you don't. You only stand there and watch him go.

And yet, although you have to see him beyond shadows twisted to hallucinations that have his ambers eyes, and speak with his throaty voice, you know he isn't gone yet.

* * *

><p>You couldn't recognize life for what it was.<p>

His absence ripped the freedom away, tore it asunder and left it on the ground to rot.

You were caged, with whispers in your head, those mocking voices that spoke over your shoulder as if they came from your own ear. Sold into oblivion, you drank in the scent of your dying breath.

Blissful oblivion was leaking away from you, draining with every step you took. The weight of your desperation a knot in your shoulders, the ache of the gap in your palm scratching deep inside your chest.

It was gone, all of it.

Any thread that held to you to life had already slipped out of your peripheral vision. The throb of that empty hole was greater now that you knew how it felt when it was filled.

Without it, you can only writhe in your own self pity, hungering for what you only briefly had, and didn't deserve.

You are a horrible being, and horrible beings are better off dead for the sake of others.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: The chapter after this is actually the last one O.O I didn't expect it to be too long anyways, seeing as the first chapter was meant to be a one-shot, and really it was due to a mistake that I continued. What is was, is I forgot to set the story as complete and then thought 'what the heck, why not?' O.o**

**Anyways...**

**Review, I'll write faster :)**


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Yup, it took me almost 2 months to get this out. Sorry, I was distracted. I wasn't unmotivated though... just nothing reminding me to write it O.o Basically, I forgot.**

**But its here now ^^**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.**

* * *

><p><em>Die<em>

Another step, dirt and leaves grinded and crushed into the bottom of your shoe, a flimsy, used cigarette flattened to the ground.

_Die_

Your hand, rust-coated but steady, comes down again. Another prick, with that jagged piece of glass you've kept in your pocket for so long. Another well of blood, swelling up to join the others.

Far more beautiful then even a budding rose, at least to you.

Prick, prick, prick. Step, step, step. And die, die, _die_.

You walk with a loping gate, under the shaded reach of trees. Oblivious to the pain, only able to watch with marveled fascination.

It's only now, when the whole world fades back behind a crimson curtain, that you can forget. Forget the regret, that eats away at your heart like desperate little worms. Regret, wishing to go back to that moment of blind foolishness. Wishing to cut away that blind hesitation like it was never there

If for only a second, you had become a child again, grasping at the sun and hoping to find the end of the rainbow, and it had cost you everything you were reaching for.

Now, alone and crudely fragile, all you could do was bleed as a cost for the smallest of comfort.

If you could still bleed, you could still die.

And yet you hadn't. You didn't even think about, consider it. The relief you'd been trying to achieve for two years now, didn't even come to mind anymore.

You weren't stopping though, no, never stopping. It was a delay. Short or long, you didn't know, but still a delay.

All because you were waiting, waiting for _him._

And somewhere, he was waiting too.

_Die._

* * *

><p>Sunset. A brilliant range of colors arching across the sky, forcing a tint on the bellies of the clouds.<p>

At least to others. Under your heavy eyes, it was just as lethargically grey as everything else. A bland mush of nothing, if only brighter.

Still, you watched it rise, despite the fact that sitting in the same spot you and _him _had sat, left a nostalgic ache over your already burning heart. You watched it, only because it resembled the one thing in the world that had yet to dull.

Calloused fingers slipped between yours, and your heart constricted, a brief flash of rare terror overtaking your mind before fading.

Fading, because you could recognize the texture of those hands even without turning to look at the owner.

The waiting period was over.

The corners of your mouth turned up, and you realized you'd forgotten how to smile. He too, seemed surprised at the matching one that spread across his face.

All the desperation and misery of the past months vanished in an instant at his presence, the waves self-directed anger lulling to a glassy pool.

Nothing mattered anymore, nothing but you and him, and the freeing moment soon to happen.

"Couldn't do it without you." He mumbled, only loud enough for you to hear.

"Me neither." You say, leaning into his grasp.

It's as if that regretful moment never happened, the rift between wanting and not wanting sewn up without a stitch. There would be no hesitation this time. Once you left together, you would stay together, even with Hell as red-eyed canine tearing at your heels.

"It's time now, isn't it?"

He can only nod in response and the two of you separate, your only intent being to return to his side, and he yours.

Silence prevailed over conversation, not only due to a lack of words, but a lack of want. Melodious clinks of silverware rose unbidden to meet the quiet, but did nothing to lessen the cold atmosphere that weighed you down no matter how many times you experienced it. They were looking at you from the corner of their eyes, cold pupils dredging on your soul as if they expected you to get down on your knees and apologize for your ineptitude simply because they stared at you.

Their eyes could not break your back, but it only served to cause an even colder look.

Strangely, it didn't bother you. Not tonight, and not ever again.

Things were so clearly meaningless now, right down to the desperation that had been clawing your heart into a ragged stump. _Meaningless_, as all if it was going fade away. Nothing would matter anymore.

Astonishment was only an eighth of feelings you had at the weightlessness of your heart. Everything had come to steep, sharp end, and you had the texture of success on the tips of your fingers.

You were already looking down at them and their lack of courage, their ignorant need to grovel at the feet of God and follow the long path he'd given them without hesitation. Looking down, with a sneer that might be seen heartless sprawled across your cheeks.

You wondered if they would ever join you and finally realize what they were missing.

Tasteless meal finished and your plates whisked away, you scampered out sight, not giving up even the sparest of moments to a reprimand.

You were done with them all, for once and forever five times over.

* * *

><p>It was with an eager tremor to your hands and trepidation bashing in your heart that you slipped your hand across a familiar steel railing.<p>

The world was slow moving, a watery prison that burdened your limbs and forced them into a lethargic pace. The catering stairway gave way to sprawling rooftop cement and everything screeched to a stop, the sight of that bush of orange hair amongst the varying grays easing your heart into a stupor. This was it. It was just as well that there was no going back, because you didn't want to anyways.

You let your arms instinctively wrap around him, if only to fill your heart with a modicum of belonging.

"Sure your ready?" He doesn't ask for his own comfort, but for yours.

And there is no hesitation.

You can feel it already; death. The black that is alike in everyway to the back of eyelids, but far more calming, because there is no waking up. You can taste that sweet revelation on the tip of your tongue, the feathers brush of its invisible touch just millimeter from your grasps.

It's near. So, so very near, to the point where adrenaline and anticipation keep you jittering on the tip of your toes.

You're at the edge of the line with him, where the man-made safety fell away to endless sky, nature's costless invitation to an artistic way out. A swan dives stretch away from all that bountiful freedom.

In a final act, not as a heartfelt goodbye but a congratulations and an 'I'll see you on the other side', his lips swoop down on yours. You press into the embrace, feeling for all the world far hungrier then you ever have before.

You want him, but no more then you want the 'love' you've been chasing all your life.

Good thing you can have both, or truly it would be a broken life.

Fingers remain entwined despite a sudden separation, grasping for a steady hold in the realization of the moment.

And then its done.

The ground has fallen away from your feet before you could make sense of it. There was no time for thought, the wind slapping at your face, your heart forcing its way out your throat.

Joy. Awe. Relief.

A spasm of emotions, all pertaining to the god-like feeling of free fall and long awaited bliss.

In freedom, you danced hand in hand within deaths callous fingers. Lost, deep in perdition with your orange-haired love, you _smiled._

* * *

><p><strong>AN: So, I decided against a alt. happy ending, because I tried written and couldn't do it. I'm sorry to the people that wanted one, but I tried to appease you a bit, with putting a bit more of a positive light to the last two sentences, as least as best I could considering the situation. **

**Well my 4th dark fic is now finished, but it won't be my last one, because strangely enough I enjoy writing them... I was think on putting to together a dark version of Bleach, with some decent plot tweaks, obviously. It would probably be about as dark as Writhe (my first dark fic), if any of you have ever read it. If any of you guys would like to see that, let me know. ^^**

**~JAM**

**P.S I apologize for mistakes, it's midnight and I'm lazy, so maybe I'll proof read/fix them later.**


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